Viva Brighton Issue #61 March 2018

FOOD
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Chard
(Not) just desserts
Pistachio roast pear
with cardamom ice
cream. I know it’s
not the done thing
to start a food review
with dessert, but
indulge me just this
once. Pistachio, pear
and cardamom; for
me there is no more
appealing combination
of flavours.
Chard post their
monthly menu on
their website, so I’d
chosen my dessert
long before we’d
arrived and there would have been tears if they
hadn’t had it. I’d thought about it all day. Visualised
it, my mouth watering in anticipation.
It was well worth the wait. Not too sweet
and with the flavours in restrained balance.
A perfectly cooked pear in a crown of
pistachio-stuffed filo, flanked by a generous
quenelle of cardamom ice cream, perfectly
white and delicately spiced. With dinner
companion Rebecca completely distracted by
a Frangelico chocolate truffle cake with rolled
hazelnut ice cream (every bit as decadent as
it sounds), I was left to savour it all to myself.
Every mouthful a delight.
We know the rules and had eaten our dinner
first of course. Both vegetarians, we’d opted for
the comforting leek and lemon barley risotto,
topped with nutty, al dente purple sprouting
broccoli, and richly seasoned with Sussex
Charmer cheese. Before that we’d shared a plate
of cool, creamy labneh with blood orange and
sumac, and a dish of fried
Sussex Medita: a locally
made feta-style sheep’smilk
cheese. Salty, savoury
and softened by the
heat of the pan, served
with tart pickled rhubarb
and earthy shavings of
beetroot. Delicious.
Located at 50 Preston
Road, Chard began life
as an evening pop up in
Café Rust, the permanent
occupant of the address.
Luckily for us, they liked
the arrangement so much
that they stayed, and now
you can enjoy the café by day and Chard by
night (from Tuesday to Friday). It’s run by two
culinarily creative sisters and their other halves,
whose philosophy is to source it locally and
make it from scratch. A slightly risky strategy in
the cold winter months - the Sussex landscape
can offer scant pickings at this time of the year
- and yet the menu is shot through with bright
flavours: buttered bream steaklets, tapenade and
citrus salsa; cider-braised pig cheeks with candied
apple & walnut black pudding, and sticky
orange almond torte with Moscato d’Asti sorbet.
I’ve always liked Preston Circus, especially the
eclectic row of shops that ply their trade beneath
the viaduct, but it’s not a place I visit often. I’m
rarely in need of a motorbike, or a splendid plaster
ceiling rose, or indeed a new bathroom but,
now I know that it deals in perfect puddings, I’ll
be popping back more often. Lizzie Lower
50 Preston Road, Tuesday – Friday, 6.30-10pm,
chardbrighton.co.uk. Around £55 for two
Photo by Lizzie Lower
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